The “nerve center” of the federal government’s censorship operations admitted ahead of the 2020 election that mass mail-in voting comes with risks but flagged online posts highlighting such insecurities to Big Tech companies for censorship anyway.
A series of internal documents obtained via open records request by America First Legal (AFL) show that the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), which falls under the Department of Homeland Security, was aware of the risks associated with unsupervised mail-in voting in the months leading up to the 2020 election. It was during this same time that the agency was classifying social media posts highlighting these risks as “disinformation” and flagging them for censorship.
The communications unearthed by AFL reveal that by September 2020, CISA officials knew there was no evidence to support the claim that in-person voting “increase[d] the spread of COVID-19” and were “aware that mass ‘vote-by-mail’ schemes” presented difficulties to election officials. Among the “major challenges” highlighted by the agency were the “process of mailing and returning ballots,” “high numbers of improperly completed ballots,” and “the shortage of personnel to process ballots in a prompt manner.”
By October 2020, CISA had crafted a six-point list titled, “Mail-In Voting Risk: Infrastructure and Process,” which detailed insecurities present in mass mail-in voting operations and offered “compensating controls” election officials could use to manage them.
